Ch8 Recap

Question 1

Affirming the consequent

Answer 1

Affirming the consequent of an “If…then…” claim and attempting to infer its antecedent

Question 2

Denying the antecedent

Answer 2

denying the antecedent of an “if…then…” claim and attempting to infer the denial of its consequent

Question 3

Undistributed Middle

Answer 3

assuming that two things that are related to a third thing must be related to each other

Question 4

equivocation

Answer 4

the use of claims as premises and / or conclusions that contain words or phrases that are interpreted in more than one way

Question 5

amphiboly

Answer 5

the use of claims as a premise and/or conclusions that contain ambiguity because of their gramattical structure

Question 6

composition

Answer 6

What is true of its parts, is true of the thing itself

assuming that what is true of a group of things taken individually must also be true of those same things taken collectively; or assuming that what is true of a whole is also true of its parts

Question 7

confusing explanation and excuses

Answer 7

presuming that, because someone is explaining how or why some event came to pass, he or she is attempting to excuse or justify that event

Question 8

confusing contraries and contradictories

Answer 8

to fail to notice that two conflicting claims can either be contraries (cannot be both true but can both be false) or contradictories (cannot both be true and cannot both be false)

Question 9

contraries

Answer 9

cannot both be true but can both be false

Question 10

contradictories

Answer 10

cannot both be true and cannot both be false

Question 11

consistency and inconsistency

Answer 11

consistency in one’s beliefs is a requirement of rationality, but the inconsistency of a person (in changing from one belief to another inconsistent with the first) does not impugn either the previously held belief or the current one.

Question 12

Incorrectly combining the probabilities of independent events

Answer 12

failing to realize that the probability of several independent events is determined by multipling the probabilities of the various events

Question 13

gambler’s fallacy

Answer 13

believing that the past performance of independent events will have an effect on a further independent event

Question 14

overlooking prior probabilities

Answer 14

failing to take into consideration the likelihood of an event all other things being equal; that is, its likelihood apart from any outside influences

Question 15

faulty inductive conversion

Answer 15

mistakenly thinking that, from information about the percentage of As that are Bs, you can derive a conclusion about the percentage of Bs that are As

Question 16

division

Answer 16

Assuming what is true of the whole, is true of its parts

opposite of composition. assuming what is true of the whole is true of an individual